Tuesday, April 6, 2010

one hot spring

I hope everyone enjoyed spring. I can't remember such a compacted season. The redbuds, which typically bloom in late January or February are just one of the early bloomers now in full swing overlapping with all the other flowering trees and shrubs that typically bloom later; everything all at once. We've gone from extremely cold (remember?) and really wet to day time highs in the upper 80s for quite a few days in a row now. I should have known when the air conditioning system here at the house kicked on today(78 degrees inside) that it was warming up quick. I went from complaining about not being able to work the wet fields to complaining about the heat- dragging hoses all over the fields today to try and save the cold-weather transplants that do not like 80 degree weather. Which reminds me...

I was planning to bite the bullet and pay to drip irrigate my fields at the incubator farm, I just didn't think I'd need it up and running for the first week of April. I'm going to order the needed materials and then have a work day where anyone who is interested can come and learn (as I learn) about how to hook up a fairly large drip irrigation system. Sound like fun?

The upside is that it's beautiful- everything is blooming and the trees are leafing out and the wonderful colour of our region is back. I once went on a 7 day cruise and we spent several days at sea with nothing to see except blue water. We arrived back at port in the evening and drove all night from Florida to North Carolina. I woke up in the morning and will never forget walking out onto the back deck of my childhood home and seeing a forest of green that seemed to hurt my eyes with the intensity of its colour. It hadn't taken long for my senses to forget and then be shocked by the beautiful colour of this place I call home.

The good news is that much is up: spinach, lettuce, mizuna, mixed greens, radishes, beets, carrots, onions, peas, arugula and garlic are all up and off to the races. I even gambled and planted 64 tomatoes last Sunday (fingers crossed) so if it does turn out to be an incredibly short spring at least my first round of tomatoes will have a head start. We'll see how the broccoli, collards, kholrabi and kale take the heat.

There are rumblings about a local food coop that might have a brick and mortar footprint. Imagine being able to go to a store and buy local food, both groceries and prepared food restaurant style to eat with other, like-minded individuals as you enjoy a pint from an NC brewery or an NC produced glass of wine. You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one; seriously if this is something you're interested in let me know. We need a small group of interested folk to get this up and running.

Don't forget the Herb Festival is April 17th. I won't be selling there but lots of other people will be. Also there are still CSA shares available with Know Your Farms. It's a multi-farm CSA to which many local growers, including myself will be contributing.